We could argue all day about the shades of grey, but when the question is as black and white as the fight against fascism, I would be mighty glad to link arms with someone with such a strong sense of fair play, such generous kindness, and so much warm feeling for his fellow humans. "[4], Like Bertie, Spode had been educated at Oxford; during his time there, he once stole a policeman's helmet. But the idea was now up for debate. A violent man, he threatens to tear Bertie's head off and make him eat it. The sight of it seemed to take me into a different and dreadful world., It was as if Nature had intended to make a gorilla, and had changed its mind at the last moment.. Her natural tough-mindedness was schooled and tempered by a fierce devotion to the Communist Party, and in particular to its work for civil rights and civil liberty. The typewriter was housed in a room also used by a saxophonist and a tap dancer. What the Voice of the People is saying is: 'Look at that frightful ass Spode, swanking about in footer bags! He is horrified. Like Seinfeld, Jeeves and Wooster was about nothing but managed compelling cultural commentary that shaped the way a generation saw the world around them. ". (The larger threats are implied.) Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division traveled to Little Rock and Pine Bluff, Arkansas, on April 24 and 25 to continue the Civil Rights Division's tour to engage with stakeholders in underserved communities and reaffirm the department's commitment to protecting the civil rights of all Americans. Did you ever in your puff see such a perfect perisher?'"[19]. One favorite plot hinges on a banjolele. for future readers?it was a very convincing one. Verified account Protected Tweets @; Suggested users Wooster gets into tangles. [15] In other novels, Spode is knocked out three times: he is hit with a cosh by Bertie's Aunt Dahlia in Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, he is punched by Harold Pinker in Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves, and Emerald Stoker smashes a china basin on his head in the same book. That should inspire us to smile from time to time. Refresh and try again. One of the squad has an apoplectic fit and keels over. Roderick Spode - 8th Earl of Sidcup : He knows why. [11], In Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, which takes place at Aunt Dahlia's country house, Brinkley Court, Spode has recently become Lord Sidcup. [7] At some point, he leaves the Black Shorts. It was a reason so preposterous, so fantastically silly, that it would take the comic genius of the Master himself - the "head of our profession", as Hilaire Belloc called Wodehouse - to do full justice to its absurdity. I looked like a movie star in my Bruce Oldfield wedding dress, Air pollution exposure can damage the heart within hours, Don't kill the Coronation with trendiness, Ukraine needs equipment to mount its offensive, More households install alarms and doorbell cameras over crime fears, Red Roses show worth in backing the womens game its time for rivals to take note. If you will recollect, we are now in Autumn season of mists and mellow fruitfulness., I couldn't have made a better shot, if I had been one of those detectives who see a chap walking along the street and deduce that he is a retired manufacturer of poppet valves named Robinson with rheumatism in one arm, living at Clapham., You cant fling the hands up in a passionate gesture when you are driving a car at fifty miles an hour. He created a composite and caricature of all of them and turned it to hilarity. Quotes By P.G. We would like to show you a description here but the site won't allow us. Because he is a butterfly, who toys with women's hearts and throws them away like soiled gloves! [12], In Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves, which takes place at Totleigh Towers, Spode is as protective of Madeline as ever and threatens to break Bertie's neck when he thinks that he has caused Madeline to cry (she was shedding a tear because she thought Bertie was lovesick and could not stay away from her). : 21: The Plot Thickens", "Classic Serial: The Code of The Woosters", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Roderick_Spode&oldid=1150150913, Fictional characters based on real people, Short description is different from Wikidata, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Fascist politician and designer of ladies' lingerie, later Earl of Sidcup, This page was last edited on 16 April 2023, at 16:01. Gussie leaves Madeline for Emerald, and Spode proposes to Madeline. When thinking of how genuine lovers of human liberty should deal with such settings, I always fall back on, Its the tragedy of real-world politics that we keep moving through these phases, trading one style of central plan for another, one type of despot for another, without understanding that none are necessary. It was the years of not being able to workas opposed to internmentthat must have been the real hell. It is available from the Guardian bookshop for 7.37. [T]/[C] (W) AfD? [15] In other novels, Spode is knocked out three times: he is hit with a cosh by Bertie's Aunt Dahlia in Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, he is punched by Harold Pinker in Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves, and Emerald Stoker smashes a china basin on his head in the same book. Spode shares a few insights on the subjects of bicycles and umbrellas with the ihabitants of Totley on the Wold. Which book would that be? But many English people heard that they happened. His privilege and his political cluelessness are included in the joke: Young men starting out in life have often asked me, How can I become an Internee? Well, there are several methods. Like everyone else, I had assumed that it was because of his behaviour during the war that P G Wodehouse was kept waiting for his knighthood until a month before his death in 1975, at the age of 93. First, Spode thinks Gussie is not devoted enough to Madeline, who is engaged to Gussie. This was not unusual for the time. Spode is a man whom Wooster describes as appearing as if Nature had intended to make a gorilla, and had changed its mind at the last moment. What the Voice of the People is saying is: 'Look at that frightful ass Spode swanking about in footer bags! 2023 Cond Nast. "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Bertie delivers . But the Code of the Woosters has a message for us here, too. Gussie says of Spode, "His general idea, if he doesn't get knocked on the head with a bottle in one of the frequent brawls in which he and his followers indulge, is to make himself a Dictator. They are just dudes who are exploiting public curiosity and fear to gain attention and power. It was as if Nature had intended to make a gorilla, and had changed its mind at the last moment. People tend to believe they must join the Left to defeat the Right or join the Right to defeat the Left, forgetting that there is a third option: rule by no party and no one, but rather by universal self-rule and the society of freedom first and always. But we should be proud to stand alongside them when it comes to the really important stuff. [14], Although Spode regularly threatens to harm others, he is generally the one who gets injured. Today the bread ration failed and we had small biscuits, he writes, on August 12, 1940. It is a matter of the nicest adjustment.Like that?Admirable, sir.I sighed.There are moments, Jeeves, when one asks oneself Do trousers matter?The mood will pass, sir.. [11], In Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, which takes place at Aunt Dahlia's country house, Brinkley Court, Spode has recently become Lord Sidcup. He gets to be so addicted to his own oratory and the cheers of the crowd that he decides the House of Lords isn't a big enough stage for him & he must disclaim his peerage & stand for the Commons. Hayek emphasized in. Spode soon wakes up, but is knocked out again, by Emerald. This should also give a more consistent style and cover age (as copied from the small articles, you'll see quite a disparity between them) - Just zis Guy, you know? That is where you make your bloomer. Dont you ever stop drinking? . Wodehouse. The whole point of Wodehouse, of course, is that he described a fantasy world that never existed and never will. I have no hesitation in saying that he has not the slightest realisation of what he is doing, a good friend of Wodehouses wrote to the Daily Telegraph. But the idea that by honouring their creator, the government would appear to be endorsing an image of Britain as a nation of Woosters and Aunt Agathas is just plain daft. In the television series Endeavour (series five episode four "Colours"), there is a reference to "Spode and Webley" being shot as fascists. Confronted with evil, Wodehouse made a ghastly error | Robert McCrum, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning, 2023 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. Because he is a butterfly, who toys with women's hearts and throws them away like soiled gloves! Spode threatens to beat Bertie to a jelly if he steals the cow-creamer from Sir Watkyn. She was bouncing through Dixie. The Saviours of Britain, nicknamed the Black Shorts, is a fictional fascist group led by Roderick Spode. As well as a moral failure, the ascendency of cruel rightwing demagogues is a sense of humour failure. The Wodehouses ended up spending the last years of their life in Remsenburg, Long Island. He is also hit in the eye with a potato at a candidate debate in Much Obliged, Jeeves.[16]. It remains unclear why he was released early, but many well-placed American friends and journalists had lobbied on his behalf. In real life, Mosley in the UK and Rockwell in the US were a serious menace, as much as the establishments they opposed. After being hit by a potato at a lively candidate debate, Spode changes his mind about standing for Parliament and decides to retain his title, leading to a reconciliation between him and Madeline. He should obviously have been bedded out in the stables., Dont you ever read the papers? Spode also antagonizes Gussie, for two reasons. Wikipedia:WikiProject Fictional characters, Template:WikiProject Fictional characters, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Roderick_Spode&oldid=587296941, WikiProject Fictional characters articles, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 22 December 2013, at 23:26. Spode soon wakes up, but is knocked out again, by Emerald. He wrote to a friend that it was a loony thing to do.. It has the substance and the arguments. I couldnt have made a better shot, if I had been one of those detectives who see a chap walking along the street and deduce that he is a retired manufacturer of poppet valves named Robinson with rheumatism in one arm, living at Clapham. "You hear them shouting 'Heil Spode!' In one of Woosters most anxious moments in the novel, Jeeves offers him instruction on the hem of his trousers: The trousers perhaps a quarter of an inch higher, sir. The trouble with you, Spode, is that just because you have succeeded in inducing a handful of half-wits to disfigure the London scene by going about in black shorts, you think you're someone. I thought that people, hearing the talks, would admire me for having kept cheerful under difficult conditions but I think I can say that what chiefly led me to make the talks was gratitude. Later, Wodehouse wrote to the editor of The Saturday Evening Post that he didnt understand why the broadcasts were seen to be callous: Mine simply flippant cheerful attitude of all British prisoners. In The Code of the Woosters, when Spode advances to attack Gussie, Gussie manages to hit him on the head with an oil painting. Far from gruntled John Turner as Roderick Spode and Hugh Laurie as Bertie Wooster in ITVs Jeeves and Wooster. Confronted by Roderick Spode, tyrannical leader of the Black Shorts, Bertie Wooster lets rip: "The trouble with you, Spode, is that just because you have succeeded in inducing a handful of. Maybe for the first weeks an illusion that internment was a brief change of circumstance would persist. Bertie says in Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves that before Spode succeeded to his title, he had been "one of those Dictators who were fairly common at one time in the metropolis", but "he gave it up when he became Lord Sidcup". Wooster relies on Jeeves to navigate the landscape, which at every moment threatens him with social embarrassment, at the least, and maybe with an engagement to a pretty woman he doesnt much like, at the most. The former bank clerk went on to write more than seventy novels and dozens of plays. We meet Spode at an antique shop; he accuses Wooster first of stealing an umbrella, then of stealing a precious antique. In The Code of the Woosters, Spode is an "amateur dictator" who leads a farcical group of fascists called the Saviours of Britain, better known as the Black Shorts. Thats how Wodehouse presented his fascist just as a silly distraction whose only value is a good joke. (Webley is another fictional fascist leader, from Aldous Huxley's Point Counter Point, and unlike Spode does end up being assassinated.). Spode is described by Wooster as looking "as if Nature had intended to make a gorilla, and had changed its mind at the last moment", which brings to mind the image of Johnson who broke his nose four times at Eton playing rugby and, only last year, shoulder-barged a ten year old to the ground during a street game in Tokyo. The entry for November 14th begins, I must make a note of this day as one of the absolutely flawless ones of my life. Even if his private journal was a kind of performancefor himself? The Code of the Woosters is perhaps the most madcap of them all. Spode, who is clearly based on Oswald Mosley, is the leader of a militaristic fascist group called the Blackshorts (shorts because all the shirt colours had already been taken) and is inordinately fond of throwing his considerable weight around: Here he laid a hand on my shoulder, and I cant remember when I have experienced anything more unpleasant. This isnt the time or the place to go into the tragedy of Wodehouses war record, but lets at least grant that he showed a good way forward against home-grown fascists and Hitler alike: you send them up as the rotters they are. The two men feature in novels and stories that make up more than a dozen books. He wrote articles and funny bits for the newspapers on the side. 19:21, 19 November 2005 (UTC)Reply[reply], Spode is a star in the TV series 'Jeeves & Wooster' & a shining exception to the general miscasting (Jeeves isn't old enough, Bertie isn't young enough, Madeline Bassett isn't silly enough & Sir Watkyn isn't nasty enough). ~ Bertram "Bertie" Wooster, The cup of tea on arrival at a country house is a thing which, as a rule, I particularly enjoy. Wodehouse and his wife had trouble getting out of Germany, but eventually moved back to France, then, after the war, to New York. What would he be thinking by November? A wonderful day! he writes on August 14th, sure, but that was only a month in, and it was summer. Spode threatens to beat Bertie to a jelly if he steals the cow-creamer from Sir Watkyn. By the novels end, Spode has been tamed. The English reading public mostly defended Wodehouse: it wasnt fair to speculate. "Norfolk shall make umbrellas and Suffolk . The books are cozier than cozy mysteries, and, like a mystery, they help take ones mind off real calamities. Having taught Wodehouse for a few years, Ive discovered that most students have never heard of him. Spode is a large and intimidating figure, with a powerful, square face. Bertie only finds out about that later when Dahlia tells him about it and how she solved the problem by discovering the cosh Bertie dropped by the safe. Later, barber is seen crouching on his bed, holding lighted match under jam jar of water, soft soap and boot blacking. as if Nature had intended to make a gorilla, and had changed its mind at the last moment, She laughed - a bit louder than I could have wished in my frail state of health, but then she is always a woman who tends to bring plaster falling from the ceiling when amused.. Apart from anything else, Sir Patrick's memo was extraordinarily insulting to Americans.